Share

The Fairfax papers have run another of ReachTEL’s large-sample automated phone polls of federal voting intention, such as it has been conducting on a semi-regular basis for the Seven Network, most recently just a week ago. This one was conducted on Thursday night from a sample of 3241, and as with last week’s poll it has the Labor lead at 54-46, from primary votes of 39.8% for Labor (up 0.2%), 37.8% for the Coalition (down 1.1%), 10.5% for the Greens (down 0.7%), 7.0% for Palmer United (up 1.0%, and adding to their recent upward trend). Other questions find majority support for a deficit levy when the question specifies it being between 1 and 2 per cent and imposed on high income earners to help reduce debt, which was favoured by 53.7% and opposed by 32.4%. However, 42% said it has made them less likely to vote for the Coalition against 22.8% for more likely. Raising the pension age to 70 is also unpopular, being supported by 21.2% and opposed by 68.1%.

Or perhaps we do not forgive this government despite them doing something we support.

Maybe this government should have proposed lifting the Medicare levy and not touched pensions, bulk-billing or other social security entitlements which we consistently have told successive governments that we like and support.

It was May 8 the other day. This was the 69th anniversary of the collapse of the Nazi regime. I tweeted as follows:

It’s now 69 years since the Nazi regime collapsed. Let’s recall the blood lust of unfettered capitalism & the courage of those who fought it.

Admittedly, the language is florid and a tweet such as that is unlikely to issue from anyone who isn’t an avowing lefty, but really, it wasn’t, to my mind, at least, controversial. There’s little controversy amongst serious folk that the Nazi regime was capitalist, at least in the sense that the German capitalist class of the time supported it in preference to the other options at the time, or that they profited mightily from its policy, at least until they were ruined by the losing war. Companies like Daimler Benz used slave labour. The phrase ‘unfettered capitalism’ seems apt.

As it goes, a fellow known to this blog ad Sinclair Davidson retweeted it, releasing whole hordes of figurative flying monkeys, who were not slow in venting their angst. People self-describing as “conservative” “libertarian” “patriot” “vet” “Texan” “republican” sporting images of themselves in front of US flags holding guns variously assailed me for what they took to be my poisonous impact on children, my ignorance of History, my unfitness to teach and so on.

The most commonly advanced objection was that the Nazis were really soc!alists, and hadn’t I noticed that the word was in the name of the party? Many of them must have thought they were the first to think of this stunning objection. It may even be so that some imagined I hadn’t been aware of this and had never wondered how this might be so. It was amusing, initially, though ultimately, more than a little sad.

Others objected that capitalists had fought the Nazis, having failed to think through the implication of Bolsheviks splitting with Mensheviks over the question of taking a side in imperialist wars. Again, coming from folk who accused me of not knowing my History, it was breathtaking.

Still others complained that capitalists were fettered in Germany because they couldn’t do free trade, or cited H!tler condemning proletarian emancipation as the most brutal form of capitalism, again without seeing that this really didn’t help their case for Nazis as soc!alists at all. Some cited him saying capitalism knew no national boundaries forgetting that every capitalist country asserts them under the rubric of sovereignty. Again, this was breathtaking.

One self-described libertarian asserted that teachers like me were a compelling argument for privatising education — presumably on the basis that this measure would offer a more robust Cordon sanitaire for children against intellectual or cultural deviance. Again, the irony was lost on him.

You never know what you will find on Twitter. Many of the objectors had fewer than 20 tweets, indicating perhaps that they had set these accounts up merely to troll me, and impress me with how many folk were violently offended by my apparent assertion that bloodlust was part and parcel with capitalism.

I resist the inference that US capitalism has disproportionately damaged the minds of Americans, relative to capitalism in other jurisdictions, but episodes like this do incline me to this view. The outpouring of bile, ignorance and angst that this fairly uncontroversial claim provoked from people overwhelmingly identifying with the most barbaric of human impulses is hard to ignore.

I fear many of our “erudite” posters on this site would be only one whisker removed from the sort of tweets you received. Many indeed most equate the NAZIs and socialists, because of a word in a name, which is sillier that assuming that the current Liberal party is in any sense liberal or the National Party in any sense national rather than regional.

I agree, ESJ – how they react to bad polling is the test of a government.

Bad polling was why Howard supported changes to the gun laws, why he cut the petrol exise and then froze it, why he went to the 2007 election supporting action on climate change (as he admits himself), why he rolled back aspects of the GST and why he commited to ‘stopping the boats’. (Just a few of the ones I can think of at the moment).

…and there’s a huge difference between a government not being democratic in nature and representing ‘unfettered capitalism.’ Indeed, some of the least democratic governments we have known have been communist.

[I tried asking some of them whether they thought the DPRK or DK was democratic, but they mostly ignored the challenge or accused me of deflecting.]

I have been reading Peter Hartcher’s comments on the Kingswood Medicare model.

We are fortunate that our GP always gives full value for a short consultation. I have never attended one of those sausage machine five minute ones.

However, I have not yet seen an explanation about the upfront fee for a “long consultation”. This is necessary for various reviews (example, an application for Carer supplement). Will the upfront fee double, or even treble, according to the length of consultation booked???

I really should look at the whole thing, instead of just randomly objecting to the bits that stand out —

[..There’s little controversy amongst serious folk that the Nazi regime was capitalist, at least in the sense that the German capitalist class of the time supported it in preference to the other options at the time, or that they profited mightily from its policy, at least until they were ruined by the losing war. Companies like Daimler Benz used slave labour. The phrase ‘unfettered capitalism’ seems apt.]

Tsk. Firstly, that ‘serious folk’ bit – a classic piece of poor argument. In other words, it’s only frivolous fools like myself who would disagree with you. The very fact I disagree with you means I am a frivolous fool.

And you see what you did with the rest of the argument? You use the term ‘unfettered capitalism’ and then water it down…apparently all a government needs is some businesses to support them and benefit from their actions and they’re unfettered capitalists.

So you’ve defined ‘unfettered capitalism’ to mean something you know it isn’t (or you wouldn’t have qualified your terminology) because you can’t sustain your argument otherwise (and thus might have to, you know, admit you were wrong, or something).

[Others objected that capitalists had fought the Nazis, having failed to think through the implication of Bolsheviks splitting with Mensheviks over the question of taking a side in imperialist wars. Again, coming from folk who accused me of not knowing my History, it was breathtaking. ]

What? A couple of organisations falling out over whether or not to support the war automatically means that all capitalists supported Hitler?

You know that’s sloppy thinking, fran. Honestly.

[Still others complained that capitalists were fettered in Germany because they couldn’t do free trade, or cited H!tler condemning proletarian emancipation as the most brutal form of capitalism, again without seeing that this really didn’t help their case for Nazis as soc!alists at all.]

Possibly because they weren’t arguing the socialist thing, but about the unfettered capitalism thing. So you had to quickly slap up a straw man or two to avoid actually dealing with their point – which was that capitalism was definitely fettered.

[..how many folk were violently offended by my apparent assertion that bloodlust was part and parcel with capitalism]

Well is it part of your assertion or not? It appears to be, but you’re too twee to say so.

Blood lust is part and parcel of the human condition (alas) which is why it occurs under virtually all ‘-isms’, forms of government, and (most if not all) religions.

[A new national security agency combining Customs and Immigration officers will oversee Australia’s borders, in what the Government is describing as “sweeping new changes” to how Australia’s borders are managed.

Australian Border Force (ABF) will begin operating in July next year and will act as the nation’s single frontline enforcement agency.]

I thought Australian Border Force was a reality TV show filmed at Sydney airport showing people getting caught with contraband.

Morning all. Thanks BK, and I second Confessions endorsement of the Mike Carlton column. The description of Liberal efforts to sell the great big new taxes is hilarious too. If only the effect on poorer Australians will be as amusing.

Departmental CEO changes are normal with the start of a new government but the speed and manner of this one was not. Rod Hook achieved plenty and defended the government a lot in the media. I have never heard anyone in Adelaide say he was incompetent. This reflected a ruthless side of Jay Weatherall in office we have not yet seen.

My sympathy on the abusive comments you received for your post. That being said, I also disagreed with your post at the time. I think that, while politics and economics are closely related, they still need to be distinguished. You can have capitalism with democracy or dictatorship, and the same with socialism. The dictatorship bit concerns me more than the capitalist/socialist distinction. IMO that was what was wrong with nazism – the loss of democracy, the rule of law and personal rights – not its alliance with German capitalism. It has happened in socialist countries too – witness Stalin and Mao.

Piketty I think sums up well the faults of unregulated capitalism. Yet he does not suggest socialism as a solution. The solution is regulation. That requires democracy, the rule of law and personal rights to be respected. Keeping those things healthy is an eternal struggle for any informed citizenry, whether in a capitalist or socialist system of economic management.